Click here to go to the next issue.

Monday and Tuesday March 12th and 13th




________________________________________________________________________________\
__


*fav jerry quote*

"the way out

is to see the mirage

and to stop the mirage making."

joy to each as all,
cee

________________________________________________________________________________\
__



Dear Cee,

If there is some kind of a get-together this summer, maybe you, me
and Michael Read (and whoever else wants to) could bring squirt guns!

I used to have so much fun with squirt guns as a kid... where have I
been all my life??? :-)

Let's talk Jerry into organizing something, he likes organizing!

Loveya,

Tim


________________________________________________________________________________\
__


Dustin:

*the blankless void*

Hey guys!

I've enjoyed reading the recent NDS posts regarding self-realization, "final"
realization, and self-awareness. Other replies
to some questions I asked a week or so ago also pushed me into a bit of a
different
direction. These new thoughts came
to me in a rush this morning. I put them into my journal, and I also lay them
down for
you here. Simple things, just
thoughts, but they came to me out of nowhere, and I wrote them down right away.

things are as they are
there is no "ultimate" reality
everything and everyone exists in their natural state
there is no enlightenment which is to attain

Q: Then who owns my personality, my personal identity? Why is it that I have
been
entrusted with this particular identity?

A: The identity, such as it is, is also just as it is. Your identity is no
different
as a thing than would be a tree's "identity" in
comparison to its own tree nature.

things are as they are
I am as I am
I am I am
I am
I AM
OM
OM
OM

( )

(parentheses encapsulating nothing - like filling a sieve with water by
throwing it
into the ocean)



~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~



Nice stuff, Dustin --

There's no identity of which
to be rid -- never was nor
could be.

There's no world from which
to be hid -- never will
or would be.

There's only this, and your
highest bid -- never
will be enough, nor
should be ;-)

Love,
Dan

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


Doc Hobbes:


>
>Q: Then who owns my personality, my personal identity?

What is this that it can be identified and as such be made personal?
Personality is an extention of OM. A step away with the word 'my'. Your
personality, no matter 'who exists', is not, so who then can own it? You are
not your 'self' as you have not met this person yet.

How do you define 'personality' and 'identity'?
Truth is... you do not. These are defined for you and thus, here is what is
and there is what is not. There is how you strive to reach the full
potential of a zodiac sign (or a compliment or a pshycic pleasing words or
the idea of a model) and then there is you that struggles with what 'it',
the identity, is not.

If you can not see these things how do you know what you are? If you strive
for these things how will you ever be still?

"People ask the way to Cold Mountain,
but not road reaches cold mountain.
Summer sky -- still ice won't melt.
The sun somes out but gets obscured by the mist.
Imintating me, where does that get you?
My mind isn't like yours.
When your mind is like mine
you can enter here."
Hanshan

The one you seek is not found in the end where words where only things to
live up to, about, and things to discard are found (although these discarded
things go no where but deeper to be found again) and are all that is
presented but rather, your search is found in that which searches its self
without its self.

What then can only be found?



________________________________________________________________________________\
__



Dear Dan,


What's your take on physical death... ?

Is there a perceived change? Obviously the 'show' is over at that point...

What is, still is...

But what happens to concepts, thought, emotions... all that? Anything
interesting to say on this topic?

Curiously Yours,

Tim


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~



Hi Tim --

Just thinking aloud about this intriguing question --
it's a question that can spark deep looking,
I share with you where I'm at here:

If alive, there is being aware of life.
There can only be "death" if
there is "being aware of death".

I am aware of death externally, of
loss of objects. Can there be such
a thing as "my" death, of
awareness of the loss of awareness?

If not, then who am I, who cannot observe
any self inside or outside, any death,
hence any birth? And what can "awareness"
be, which can never observe itself as a something
to be had or lost, yet which seems to be when
an object is cognized, and yet can't be said not to be,
for how would that be known?

And what, then, are
these "objects" that seem to be able
to be born and die? Only "my" production
while believed possible to cognize an
external object, and while believed to be subject
to conditions.

If such belief is not, where can be anchored
a stream of thoughts, associations, memories
and experiences?

Of course - trying to know ahead
gives a perspective of the future
based on projection of present concepts.
Of what use will that be to a corpse? ;-)

When I die, the universe dies.
And because the universe can't die,
I live.

What is not, cannot be perceived.
What is not, is death.

What is called death is thus only
the gateway of/to universal life,
the original face that can't be
perceived.

What is usually discussed as
"death of the physical body"
is the ending of a cognized
object subject to conditions
of becoming and ending.

The real physical body isn't the
cognized object, hence isn't
subject to conditions, such
as history and location.

As the subject-object situation
cognized and objectified as
"the physical body"
dies, there can be a shift from the
attempt to embed experience
in a container of experience.

Death is, thus, the opportunity to
shift from locatable objectifiable
experience to "something else",
which language based on
experience with and as sensory
objects can't convey.

Again, there is no death of the real
body, so it may be "reccognized" that
the death of any objectifiable body
has already occurred.

However, without such "recognition".
the so-called "death of the physical
body" can bring resistance,
the attempt to retain the perceived
"stream of perception and memory" --
experience for a "me"; transitional
realms are generated by the attempt
to retain cognized images and experience.

This planet Earth is therefore a transitional realm
as much as any realm constructed "after the death
of the body".
We are as much "between bodies" now as
we "will be" after the death of this physical
body.

Which might lead one to observe:

The death of the physical body ends
the process of that body, with its
concepts, associations, historical
context, and emotional context.

What has died?
A process.
What was the process?
A self-reflexive stream of experience
separated from the ocean beyond.

What has died?
Nothing.
What is the significance of death?

It is highly significant while the
sense of observer-observed is
maintained -- otherwise of no
import.

What's your take (or give)?

Love,
Dan


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~



Dear Dan-ji,

Sorry for snipping your (excellent) post, it was long.

My take? Far less "complex" than yours, perhaps :-).

Physical bodies (I'll use this term for the so-called "body/mind")
can be observed as "being born" and "dying." The birth of a body
involves an observed integration, and the death of a body as an
observed disintegration.

For the sake of discussion, I'll assume there is such a thing as
physical birth and death, since no birth is remembered here, and I am
only told that this one will die -- it's all hearsay, despite
observing something happening with "other bodies."

The body being temporary, I see it as subject to the same 'laws' as
anything temporary... that of arising, abiding for an
unspecified "period," and then subsiding again. Such patterns can be
observed literally everywhere... ocean tides, the seasons, planetary
movements, sleep patterns, thoughts, nations, cultures, stars, solar
systems, galaxies, ad-infinitum.

There is an "apperceivable" background to all this. All these things
seem to appear "within" or "against" this background. In order for
change to be observed or perceived, an unchanging background is
assumed (else "observer" would be changing with "observed" and all
would appear static).

That is assuming, of course that "observer" and "observed" do not
appear to change at different "rates"... which makes no sense as seen
from here, and is not indicated by anything whatever, scientifically
or "spiritually."

Anyway, my take is that the "background" in which these movements
appear to occur is unchanging and unchangeable. Since there is no
division anywhere, physical birth and death are precisely the same as
all other arisings, abidances and subsidings -- take your pick.

Certainly no more "threatening" than the ocean tides! Nothing is
happening... bodies appear to arise, abide and subside -- as all
else "manifest" appears to arise, abide and subside.

There can certainly be no "reincarnation," at least as commonly
defined. The ocean tide that arises is not the same tide as the
previous cycle that arose... nor the new season the same one that
arose last year.

Beyond this, I know nothing -- except perhaps that for description
purposes at least, I am the unchanging, timeless, spaceless,
attribute-less 'background'. The 'movie screen' is unaffected by
that which is projected upon it.

Namaste,

Tim


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~




[Jumping in here]

Hi Dan,

One of the hardest things that I had to deal with in my thinking through my
own dying, was the realization that everything goes on as before...trees
grow, seasons come and go, cars run. It was the radio playing in my car that
made me angry...that stupid radio station would go on whether I was there to
hear it or not. LIFE would continue...how dare it! I...the center of my
universe would be no longer.

<< When I die, the universe dies.
And because the universe can't die,
I live. >>

Disagree...
your universe stops,
when you are dead,
the universal universe
just keeps humming right along...

You, me, all of us...
are just a spit
in a never-ending stream...
totally unimportant,
creating and dying,
out with the old,
mourn briefly at the loss...
in with the new...
never ending cosmos
that goes on blindly ahead
like an infinite foot stepping on
ants in its path...a non -sentient
juggernaut of cosmic proportions.

<< What has died?
Nothing.
What is the significance of death?


It is highly significant while the
sense of observer-observed is
maintained -- otherwise of no
import.>>


OK...this I agree with...
no import...neither have we.

I know that I left a lot out...your words explain themselves perfectly...just
my 2 cents.

Nice, thank you.

beth

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


Hi Beth!

>One of the hardest things that I had to deal with in my thinking through my
>own dying, was the realization that everything goes on as before...trees
>grow, seasons come and go, cars run.

Thought plays tricks.
Only with questioning the root assumptions of
thought will the tricks be revealed as they are.

In looking into this idea about things going
on as before, one can ask: goes on for whom?

This is the same as the question: who lives, who dies?

> It was the radio playing in my car that
>made me angry...that stupid radio station would go on whether I was there to
>hear it or not. LIFE would continue...how dare it! I...the center of my
>universe would be no longer.

The center of "the universe" can be lost,
because there is no center.
"The universe" can not be lost, because it
is all that is.
The universe and who I am are not two.


><< When I die, the universe dies.
>And because the universe can't die,
> I live. >>
>
>Disagree...
>your universe stops,
>when you are dead,
>the universal universe
>just keeps humming right along...

I don't hear what you are saying as
a complete disagreement
with what I said.
The "I-being" that seemingly
dies, and the "universal
universe" that can't die,
aren't two different things.

There is no separation between
my universe and the universal
universe, except that my universe
depends on a point of view a
"me" that is never really there.

So, when my universe
ends, nothing ends, except for
an imagined point of view.

The universe that depends on
that point of view vanishes.
In truth, it never really was,
it was always "the past".
And the universe that never
came into being doesn't go
out of being: my "true self",
timeless presence.


>You, me, all of us...
>are just a spit
>in a never-ending stream...
>totally unimportant,
>creating and dying,
>out with the old,
>mourn briefly at the loss...
>in with the new...
>never ending cosmos
>that goes on blindly ahead
>like an infinite foot stepping on
>ants in its path...a non -sentient
>juggernaut of cosmic proportions.

Are you so sure that the foot
and what the foot steps on
are two separate things,
totally different in quality?

Where is sentience located?
Who defines where sentience
is located? Where is that
one located? And who locates
that one?

Is the one who defines the location
of sentience nonsentient?
How could that be possible?

><< What has died?
>Nothing.
>What is the significance of death?
>
>
>It is highly significant while the
> sense of observer-observed is
> maintained -- otherwise of no
> import.>>
>
>
>OK...this I agree with...
>no import...neither have we.

Yes. If there is no import,
then you are beyond
being born or being dead,
beyond coming into existence
or out of existence.


>I know that I left a lot out...your words explain themselves perfectly...just
>my 2 cents.

Ah. I'm glad I was clear.
And thanks for your two cents.
Much appreciated --

Dan

________________________________________________________________________________\
__

Tim:

<snip>
We make pretty noises at one another like birds. We "hear" only ourselves
(assumptions and conclusions regarding 'the other') -- our own
thought-stream -- and imagine we are actually "hearing" the other.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


>
> Tweet tweet, you tweetie pie, you...

That one I got... communication is one thing, whispering tweet
nothings is something else entirely ;-).

> I dunno, THIS one seems loud and clear.
>
> Tin -eared Glo-bird

In birdless communion,

Tim

________________________________________________________________________________\
__


<snip>
> a failed attempt at communication...

Actually it only appears to be a failure, if you are looking at the world
through failure-coloured glasses.

Love, Sarlo


________________________________________________________________________________\
__


> > How can I be sure such "death of
> > the world" isn't occurring this
> > instant?
>
>Be sure it is.
>
>andrew


Or, is it just the breeze of
a butterfly's wings?

The Cheshire universe smiles softly.

d.
an

________________________________________________________________________________\
__

I confess. If Tim or anyone writes something vaguely critical, I feel
bad, and if someone (like Gloria, for example) writes something nice
in response to a post, I feel good. Would this qualify as
communication? Terry



Greg wrote:
>Terry,
>
>I like your candor!


Yup -
Terry's candoriferous!

Cool, too ...

Dan

top of page